More Tanabata

Inside the station building, I found another hanging in the stairwell between the second and third floors. The second floor has shops and the third has a branch office of town hall. There is also a room for the public where we have a GO club meetings. I just realized that I forgot to mention that these are a traditional part of Tanabata, a summer festival.

Tanabata

This is at the station building and in front of a day nursery that takes care of children on a regular basis while the parents work. The very strange looking tree is actually a bamboo pole with the branches still on it. During July, these are placed around in public places and people write their wishes on a piece of paper and tie it to the tree. Last year they even had one in the public area of the wing of the hospital I was in. Supposedly your wish may come true.

Parking lot cashier

The large black writing says that this is the exit to the parking lot. The canvas cover protects the machine from the sun which is very hot here because of the strong ultraviolet. Having the cashier machine out of the rain is probably a good thing, too. When you enter the parking lot, you get a card from another machine. As you exit, you must stop and insert that card in this machine which calculates the fee. You can pay in bills and/or coins. After you put in the money and get change, if any, the black and yellow bar will raise and you can leave.

Parking lots

This is a rental parking lot with lots on both sides of the road. The picture I  posted yesterday showed the bedding, futons, that you can see on the right. From that one story house, my apartment is the third one. There is a three story apartment building, the white one, then a private home and finally our building at the point where this road dead ends.

This area has many rental parking spots. We are less than a five minute walk from the Shinkansen station that allows access to the big city, Fukuoka, in less than ten minutes. Driving from here would take thirty to forty minutes depending on traffic. Another reason for all the parking spots is the increasing number of large apartment buildings. These usually do not have parking or, if they do, there are are an insufficient number of spaces.

My apartment comes with a free parking space. There is one for each apartment. However, we no longer have a car, so we only use it for guests.